The Minister for Finance, Ken Ofori-Attah, has issued a warning to mobile money vendors across the country to desist from charging additional 2% on mobile money transactions.

According to the minister of finance, sending money does not accrue any charges but it is only at the withdrawal charge which is typically 1%.

He further stated that, there is a cap at GHC10 on GHc10, 000 upwards.

Mr Ofori-Atta, indicated that the value of mobile transactions has grown rapidly from GHC 594m to 2.2 billion Ghana cedis

He made this known when the MP for Krachi East, Michael Gyato was seeking clarity on the matter.

Speaking in an extensive interview with Afia Kwarteng after the proceedings the member of parliament for Krachie, Mr Michael Gyato said it would be unlawful for mobile money vendors to charge 2% on GHc 100 and above.

He said it will be prudent to have a legislation to stop such activities.

Data on Mobile Money

The value of transactions carried out on mobile money platforms for 2018 reached ¢233 billion, the Bank if Ghana’s statistics covering electronic payments for 2018/indicated.

Breakdown of Data

The data showed the value of transactions increased from ¢155 billion to ¢233 billion representing 43% growth in just a year.

The Data secured from the Bank of Ghana also showed that the volume of transactions on the Mobile Money platform increased from 2017 to 2018 reached ¢1.4 billion.

The value of transactions had also seen a significant increase from 2012 to 2018. For instance, in 2012 total transactions, reached ¢594 million and increased significantly every year to hit ¢233 billion in 2018.

Mobile Money accounts held with Commercial Banks

The total value of mobile money accounts held with commercial banks ending December 2018 reached ¢2.6 billion, up by 13.48% in 2017. It stood at ¢2.3 billion in 2017 from ¢1.2 billion in 2016.

Mobile Money Agents/ Mobile Money Accounts

The data from the Bank of Ghana revealed that the total number of mobile money agents ending December stood at 393,000 up by 194, 000 from 2017 representing 103 per cent increase. However, only 180,000 are said to active.

Mobile Money accounts at the end of December 2018 was 32 million. This represents a 17.43 per cent jump of the 23.9 million registered accounts in 2017.

The data, however, revealed that only 13 million accounts were said to be active as at December 2018.

The Bank of Ghana data also puts mobile voice subscriptions at ¢40 million, ending September 2018.